The Warmth of the Night
by more-than-words
Summary: Set after 10.6. Massively, completely AU. Six months after Harry has left the country to avoid being taken into custody by the CIA, Ruth sets out to find him. Fluff in a warm climate.
1. Chapter 1

**Disclaimer: I don't own Spooks or, indeed, much of anything at all really.**

**Hi again, Spooks fans! It's been a while. **

**This fic was bashed out in about 2 hours, so is probably a bit iffy here and there. It is also rather AU. Imagine, if you will, that rather than the Actual Spooks Ending of Doom and Back-to-Work-as-Normal, Harry instead ended up buggering off out of the country to avoid the CIA and Ruth didn't fatally walk into a bit of glass. Then, six months or so later, this mad and improbable fic happens. No idea where it's going, but ah well! ;)**

* * *

A phone rings in the middle of the night. For a moment, Ruth doesn't wake at the sound. She's deeply asleep and dreaming. In her dream, an alarm goes off and she's running down a corridor to the sound of a screaming, insistent siren, knowing she isn't going to make it out in time.

She wakes, breathless and anxious, with the phone already halfway to her ear – so used to being woken by emergencies in the dark hours that she can almost deal with them in her sleep, now. She presses the answer button and feels the cold plastic and glass of the phone against her skin. It contrasts with the heat from the duvet and makes her jolt.

"'lo?" It's only after she's answered that she realises she didn't check to see who was calling at this hour, and she has only just picked up on the fact that the phone she is holding is not the phone she uses for work. This is the phone she has had for the past few months – _just in case _– not knowing if it would ever ring, but which she has been very careful to keep charged anyway – _just in case._

There is no answer, but she can hear deep, unmistakeable breathing on the other end of the phone line. She sits up in bed, letting the covers fall to her waist.

"Hello?" she says again, as though she doesn't know perfectly well who is calling her.

Another long silence, and she imagines her caller sitting with his eyes closed, holding the phone to his ear and smiling that little half smile that always makes her melt.

"Where are you?" She closes her eyes and concentrates, listening hard. She thinks she can hear people in the background, but muffled, as though they are far away. She might be imagining it, but she thinks she can hear the sea. She imagines a warm ocean and a heavy, comforting breeze and light, loose clothing and sultry heat that is perfect for being in love.

There is no question about what she is going to do. "Are you safe?" she asks Harry.

It takes him a while to answer, no doubt not wanting to risk speech on the off-chance that someone might be listening in, despite the security measures that have been taken, and debating how best to get his message across. After a minute, it comes. A reply, tapped out in Morse code. _Y-E-S._

"Will it – you - stay safe, where you are at the moment?"

_Y-E-S._

"Are you sure?" The sceptic in her can't help but ask.

He chuckles quietly at that.

She smiles, too. She has been waiting for this phone call for so long, all the time worrying that it would never come, worrying what she would say and do if it did come. It turns out it's easy, really. "I'll find you," she says. "Don't go anywhere, stay right where you are. I'll find you."

_Y-E-S._

* * *

It takes her three weeks and the help of Malcolm to find him. It takes another three weeks to extract herself from the Home Office – a task made easier by the fact that the Home Secretary has been quietly expecting this ever since Harry left – and to ready everything so that she can leave.

Ruth doesn't know when she will next be in her flat – if she will ever be at all – so she cleans it carefully and diligently empties it of the things that matter most to her. Some of her possessions go into storage, while the most precious items are left with Malcolm. She buys Malcolm a bottle of expensive whiskey before she leaves; he has done a lot over the past few months, keeping her personal secrets and Harry's, as well as becoming the guardian of a large packet of documents that consists of Ruth's and Harry's insurance policy from MI-5.

An insurance policy in the loosest sense of the term, of course, but she is certain that should they ever need to cash in any of the intelligence that they've gathered between them over the years, there is enough there to keep them going well into the next century.

She first takes the Eurostar to Brussels, and spends a couple of days looking over her shoulder before moving on. Next up is a flight to Amsterdam, where she spends longer – a week this time. She spends part of her time in internet cafes and on computers in public libraries, checking that she hasn't been followed, making sure that there will be nothing to stop her keeping her promise to Harry, double and triple-checking the remainder of her travel plans.

She visits a couple of the museums too, laughs when a couple of youths in a café try to persuade her to try some magic mushrooms, and enjoys walking along the river. She thinks she'd like to come back, one day. With company, of course.

Eventually, she makes her way to Schiphol Airport – large and anonymous; the perfect place to catch her flight. It's ten days since she left Britain and she has been careful to cover her tracks. She knows she probably doesn't need to; Towers had told her, cryptically, when she left her job, that he was sure no one would bother her again, and she knows Malcolm will take care of her from a distance, but old habits die hard.

Ruth changes planes at Newark. It is the one part of the journey she has been dreading: stepping foot in the US, when it was not so long ago that Harry wormed his way out of CIA detention, largely thanks to the diversionary tactics of herself and Section D. Nothing can be proved, of course, but she's still half-expecting trouble at the border in retribution, and has to wipe sweaty palms dry on her skirt before she has her fingerprints taken at the passport control desk.

It all goes as it should, and two minutes later, she has an entry stamp in her passport and is rushing to catch her connecting flight. The sudden activity and the dash to the gate keeps her mind occupied for all the time it takes to get on the next plane and settle herself for take-off.

* * *

Ruth is exhausted when the plane lands at its destination. She hasn't slept on the flight; too full of nerves and excitement and something she can't quite put her finger on to sleep or even relax.

The airport terminal is hot and airless, and the queue at the border followed by the wait for her baggage seems to take forever. It is nearing midnight, local time. She has been awake for more than twenty four hours, and hasn't slept properly since she left London. Her modest suitcase feels very heavy in her hand as she finally steps outside to find a taxi.

The night is hot and sticky, and she learns from her taxi driver that it hasn't rained in a couple of weeks. He tells her they are due a storm, and that he hopes she won't be too disappointed by the coming rain. He compliments her on her language skills and tells her not to worry about holidaying on her own. This is a wonderful place to meet people.

She doesn't correct him as to why she is here, merely sits back and lets the man talk. With him talking in such rapid Spanish she has to concentrate to keep up and the air conditioning blasting strongly from the vent, she manages to keep herself alert enough to follow the route from the airport to her destination.

The taxi drops her outside a large hotel, which is still busy with people despite the late hour. Ruth tips the driver and then moves discreetly back from the sightline of the main entrance. Five minutes later, another taxi – pre-ordered this time – pulls into the wide driveway, here to collect her.

Part of her wishes she hadn't bothered with this extra precaution; a second taxi to take her the remainder of the way to Harry, but she knows it will be worth it. It wouldn't do for her whole plan to fail because she was too lazy to switch cabs on the way from the airport.

It takes another half an hour to reach her destination – a big, upmarket resort mostly frequented by middle aged Brits and Germans with cash to spend on fancy holidays in the sun. She can see why Harry chose it; large and anonymous enough for him to blend in with people not too dissimilar from himself in terms of demographics, yet far enough away from Europe and sufficiently unlikely enough that no one would think to look for him here.

He only arrived a couple of days ago too; Malcolm had previously traced him to a hotel twenty minutes away, but two days before Ruth had been due to leave, she had received a text message with coordinates, and a bit of investigative fiddling on the internet had led her here.

Specifically, to room 415.

Through good fortune, her taxi arrives at the same time as a coach load of tourists, some of whom Ruth recognises from her flight. They are all tired and anxious to get to their rooms, and the confusion while they are all trying to check in at once gives her the cover she needs to slip past reception and to the lifts.

All the way up to the fourth floor, her heart beats wildly.

* * *

The door looks so innocuous. Smooth wood stained a dark cherry, the little metal numbers polished and easy to read. A spyhole and a door handle. Ruth can't tell whether there is a light on in the room or not.

Down the corridor, she hears the ding of the lift and knows she needs to do this now, lest she get caught loitering outside a room without a key. She takes a deep breath, and knocks on the door.

* * *

Harry is on the balcony when he hears the knock on his door. He glances at his watch; half past one in the morning. There is only one person it can be.

He has made a hobby out of studying flight arrival times for the past few days, ever since he checked in to this new hotel on the Mexican coast, trying to work out what time she might land, adding in airport queues and the drive time from Cancun airport to deduce when she would arrive.

It turns out he is almost spot on in his predictions. He takes a deep breath and holds the warm air in his lungs for a moment, summoning up the courage he hasn't needed to use in a while.

Then he turns, and crosses the floor softly, and forces himself to check the spyhole before he pulls open the door. She is looking off down the corridor, and Harry allows himself a couple of seconds just to stare at her. Then, not wanting to stall any longer, he opens the door as casually as he can.

Her head turns and her gaze locks onto his instantly. They stare at each other for a long moment in silence, before Harry reaches out to gently take Ruth's arm and lead her into the room, relieving her of her suitcase as she passes him. "Come in," he says, the first thing he has said to her in six months, since they were forced to say goodbye in a hurry when he was spirited out of the country to avoid being captured by the CIA.

Ruth walks into the centre of the large room and then turns back to face him, crossing her arms across her stomach. She looks exhausted, he thinks. He knows she will have been travelling non-stop for at least a full day, and that she will have been on the move for weeks before that. It takes its toll. It took its toll on him, too; months spent moving from place to place until he felt secure enough to stop.

He walks towards her and stops just in front of her. Somehow, without knowing who made the move, she ends up in his arms. She feels boneless against him and he is convinced that if he were to stay still, she would fall asleep with her cheek against his shoulder. Slowly, her arms come up around his waist and he feels her fingers bunching the material of his shirt, as though she needs something to hold onto.

"I'm so glad you're here," he says, his hand in her hair, trying not to think about the time several months ago when he was concerned he might never see her again, and wasn't even one hundred per cent sure if she would want to see him again. It had taken him weeks to get up the courage to finally call her on the secret mobile. The elation he had felt when she told him she would find him still made him smile.

Ruth shifts in his hold so she can look up at him. "So am I," she says, like she is surprised to finally find herself here. Then she speaks to his chest, "It's been a long time coming."

He knows she means more than just this particular reunion – there is so much, with them, that has been a long time coming – but knows that this is not the time to get into a conversation about everything that has come before and where they ought to go from here. That can come later. For now, everything they need to do is simple, and finite, and lovely.

"You must be shattered," he says to her, stroking his thumb across her arm, her bare skin slightly clammy from the heat and the hours of uncomfortable travelling.

She nods and leans a little further into him.

Unwillingly, he pulls away slightly and then guides her into the bathroom, pausing by the door to switch on the light. "Have a shower," he says. "It'll make you feel better. Then we can sleep."

It's a testament to how tired she is – and, perhaps, the budding unspoken agreement between them – that she says nothing about the fact there is only one bed in the room. It is a very large bed, and very comfortable. More than good enough for two.

Harry hands Ruth her suitcase and she disappears into the bathroom, locking the door behind her. He takes the time to ready himself for bed, switching his light button-down shirt for a loose t-shirt and taking off his casual trousers before replacing the central light with the muted glow of the bedside lamp.

He slides shut the glass door that leads to the balcony, then goes to the fridge in the corner of the room and pulls out two small bottle of water. He places one on each side of the bed and then spends a few minutes faffing with the air conditioning, trying to get it just right. The normalcy, the domesticity, of the whole thing after so long of them having nothing even approaching normal amuses him and warms him. He likes it. By the time he is done, he can no longer hear the shower running in the bathroom.

Thirty seconds later, the door opens and Ruth comes in, wearing a man's blue dress shirt that falls almost to her knees.

It is one of the sexiest things Harry has ever seen. "I recognise that shirt," he says, a smile in his voice and on his face.

Ruth blushes slightly and nods, a smile on her face too. "I took it from your house a few months ago," she tells him.

He suspects that shirt wasn't the only thing she took from his house after he left, a fact for which he is grateful. There were papers in there that he'd rather others didn't see. Still, there is no point dwelling on that now, not when Ruth is sitting on the edge of the bed across from him, looking beautiful and as though she will fall asleep any second.

He pulls back the covers and they both climb in, lying close enough that he can smell her soap. He wants to hold her.

"I hope you won't think I'm terrible company if I just go straight to sleep," Ruth mumbles. "It's been a long day."

He shakes his head. "Of course not. We've got all the time in the world." He reaches over to switch off the light and then, in the dark, his hand finds hers as they drift off to sleep in the warmth of the Mexican night.

* * *

**Can't decide whether or not this needs another chapter, so let me know if you'd like to read more :)**


	2. Chapter 2

**Thank you to everyone who read and reviewed chapter one. You are all lovely. And here's chapter two, in which Harry and Ruth mostly have an, um, incident of an adult nature. Written with the aid of wine and, therefore, possibly insane (yet still fairly polite, mostly. Everyone involved is British, after all. That's my story, anyway). ;)**

* * *

Ruth isn't sure what time it is when she wakes, but it is late enough that the sun is already fairly high in the sky and Harry is no longer in the bed with her. She stretches luxuriously beneath the soft sheets, feeling infinitely better for the sleep. A light breeze dances over her and she realises that the door to the balcony must be open.

She turns her head, and can just make out Harry through the thin silky curtain that he has left pulled shut across the doorway. He's looking out at… she isn't sure what. It was too dark, and she was too sleepy, last night to really take much notice of the surroundings. But she knows that this resort is on the beach; he must be looking at the sea.

Feeling content where she is but her curiosity getting the better of her as ever, Ruth pulls herself out of bed and quickly ducks into the bathroom, taking a couple of minutes to tidy herself up, use the facilities, brush her teeth and look once at her hair in the mirror before deciding bedhead might be quite a good look for their current situation. She thinks about changing into some of the clothes she has bought with her, but she likes the blue shirt, and she knows Harry likes her in the blue shirt, so she leaves it on.

Walking slowly back into the room, she pauses for a drink of water and watches Harry for a minute between the gap in the curtains. He's probably aware she's up, but he makes no attempt to move. She's torn between thinking he's waiting for her to call the shots and that he's just enjoying the warm sun – something that is seen all too rarely in damp little Britain.

Harry has got a tan. A careful tan, clearly, one built up slowly over the course of weeks, while wearing sunblock. It looks like a tan that will last for a while. It suggests to Ruth that he has been in sunnier climes for a time already. It suits him, she thinks. It brings out his eyes and his masculinity and his hair is lighter than before, and she is thrilled that she can think about him like this now, without having to worry about MI-5 or terrorists or what they should and shouldn't have together.

She came to the conclusion a while ago that life is too short for worries such as what other people might think, and she has decided that this is the perfect time to put it into practice.

Ruth steps outside into the sunshine. "Hi," she says to Harry, blinking in the bright light and feeling ever so slightly tentative around him. It has been a long time since she's seen him properly, after all.

He gives her a brilliant smile. "Morning."

Harry is sitting at a small table, which is covered with breakfast food – toast and fruit and bacon and, Ruth is pleased to note, tea. She joins him. "When did all this arrive?"

"I got it from the buffet downstairs while you were still sleeping."

She's surprised at that. "I can't believe I slept through you leaving the room and coming back again with your pockets full of stolen bacon."

"You were tired," he says simply, and reaches out to fill a plate with food, which he then pushes towards her. "And now you must be hungry."

Ruth is struck suddenly at how weird it is that they are being so… normal. They have never really been normal before. For a moment, it makes her want to laugh. She changes her mind quickly when she sees the look of affection in Harry's eyes, and the careful way in which he avoids staring at her legs, bare under the blue shirt. She looks at him until he looks back, and then she reaches out to touch his face with one hand, drawing him towards her. She kisses him with her eyes closed, feeling his hand come up to tenderly hold her wrist and stroke her pulse point with his thumb.

It lasts for maybe thirty seconds before her stomach rumbles and she realises that actually, she is hungry. She draws back from Harry to find him looking inordinately pleased, his cheeks a little pink. He kisses her hand before letting go and settling back in his chair so she can eat her breakfast. The food is good, and it doesn't take her long to clear her plate.

Finished with eating, she sits back in the chair and turns her face to the sun. "This is wonderful."

His voice, when he speaks, is closer to her ear than she was imagining. "It is, isn't it?"

Harry reaches out a hand and very gently touches her ear with his finger. The touch tickles and makes Ruth shiver, but when he runs his finger just behind her ear, it feels wonderful, and makes her moan. She turns her head to look at him, and enjoys drinking in the sight of his lovely, tanned face as he busies himself tracing her features with his index finger, as though he is trying to learn the contours of her face.

It is relaxing and sensual all in one go, and all those years spent running from him suddenly make no sense at all. They make even less sense when his finger drops from her chin to her throat and trails a line down into the v of her shirt, where she has left several of the buttons undone because of the heat. Harry's touch comes to a stop in the middle of her chest, just over her heart, where he presses his whole palm down against her. She can feel one of his fingers just brushing the side of her breast, and knows he'll feel her pulse speed up because of it.

He leans in to kiss her again, this time easing her mouth open with his other hand so he can very deliberately slide his tongue against hers. Ruth responds in kind, dislodging his hand from her chest so she can run her hands up his arms, pressing as close to him as she can while still remaining on her own chair.

They pull away after a few minutes and then sit back, looking at each other. They stay that way for a while.

* * *

By unspoken agreement, it seems they have decided that they will not discuss anything difficult just yet. Harry is more than happy with this arrangement. Finally, his exile is feeling like a holiday, and he is enjoying himself more than he has in years.

It was after eleven when Ruth finally woke, and by the time they leave the room, it is after one. "There's basically anything a person could ever need here," he tells her as they stand waiting for a lift. "We need never leave if we don't wish to."

And, he thinks, if staying here means he gets to see her in more pretty, summery dresses, he'll be happy to stay here for a good long while. In reality, he suspects it will probably only be a few weeks before they move on; he wants to give her a home, if she'll let him. Somewhere permanent, and theirs, that they choose together. One day, at some point, perhaps they will even be able to make their way back to Britain, once attentions have moved on from him.

For now though, this is good enough. Harry takes Ruth on a tour of the resort, and lets her in on the reason he decided to move from his previous lodgings. "Partly for security," he says, "but also so it'd look more believable when you arrived. I hope you don't mind, but I checked you in four days ago as my wife."

It seems he still has the power to shock her. Standing in the shade by the all-inclusive bar, drinking an icy cranberry juice, Ruth blushes the same shade as her drink.

She recovers quickly though, and gets him back with one of her own. "In that case, I'm very disappointed you haven't got me a wedding ring."

He decides he'll tell her later that, actually, he's got a couple of rings in his suitcase, and she's more than welcome to wear one of them.

* * *

"I feel like it should be harder than this."

Harry looks up from his wine. They are sitting outside in the evening, just as the light is starting to fade and the storm clouds, long overdue, are starting to roll in off the ocean. They have just eaten a lovely meal in the hotel's a la carte restaurant, and he isn't quite sure where Ruth's declaration has come from, but he supposes he should have been expecting it. "What do you mean?"

She drinks some of her wine and shifts in her chair. Her hair is slightly damp at the temples; it's a sticky night, sweaty and close. The storm needs to break soon. "I'm not sure. I suppose I'm just surprised."

"Surprised?"

"At how simple things really are. Stupid, I know, but I've spent my whole career making a living out of analysing complicated things, and I suppose somewhere along the way I forgot that really, most things aren't hard."

He smiles, and waits. He knows she has more to say.

"I love you, Harry." She says it like it's obvious, like she can't believe she didn't think of it before.

He doesn't know what he was expecting, but he wasn't expecting that, at least not yet. The admission quietly stuns him, but there's only one response he can give. "And I love you."

She looks at him, her eyes big and glassy. "You're still here, despite…"

"Never mind despite." If the past few months have taught him anything, it's that all that really matters is the here and now. He loves her. She loves him. Everything else is, at this moment, white noise. "Are you ready to go upstairs?"

Ruth nods, and takes the hand that he offers as they leave the restaurant and head back to their room. Somewhere out at sea, still miles away, a low rumble of thunder rolls in towards the land.

* * *

It is stuffy in the room, but despite the heat, Harry doesn't want to switch on the air conditioning. For some reason, he doesn't want to spoil the evening with the artificial cool it will bring. Instead, he opens the doors to the balcony, letting the strengthening breeze blow in through the open window.

The lights are off, but it isn't dark in the room. The sky still has some colour, and the lights outside are starting to come on for the evening. In this context, in a foreign country and with everything currently new and unexplored, Harry thinks it makes the room feel romantic.

It feels even more romantic when Ruth comes up behind him and holds his arms in her hands. She stretches up to place a kiss on the back of his neck and he is suddenly struck by their separateness – he has no idea what this feels like for her, only knows that for him it is amazing, and that they seem to be on the same page. He stands still and lets his eyes fall shut as she kisses him again before letting her hands fall to his hips so she can pull his shirt from his trousers.

He turns in her arms then and pulls her into him with one firm hand on the small of her back. He feels the wind on his own back, and the combined sensation of soft warmth and curves pressing against his front and the cooler air that is stealing up behind him has his head spinning.

There is another rumble of thunder out at sea, but closer this time, and it is followed by a flash of lightning so bright he couldn't have seen Ruth more clearly than if it had been midday. "I think the rain is coming," he says, unnecessarily. Of course the rain is coming. This storm has been coming for days.

As if on cue, the first drops start to fall outside. He hears them hit the leaves on the trees outside the hotel, and the wall that lines their balcony.

Ruth smiles. She links her arms around his neck and pulls his head down to hers for a kiss that leaves him reeling. Then she moves away from him and steps past him, out the door and onto the balcony. The rain is starting to pick up, bouncing off the glass table where they had eaten their breakfast earlier. Most of the balcony is sheltered from the weather, but Ruth keeps walking until she steps out from under the overhang and into the increasingly heavy rain.

She turns and looks back him, and Harry realises he has been staring again. It seems he can't stop. He stands just inside the door and watches as Ruth turns her face to the sky and lets the water fall over her. Her dress is soaked within a minute, clinging to her body in all the right places. She is backlit by the lights from the beach, and Harry thinks that this would be a good image to die to.

But not just yet. It seems he's missing out on the fun. Kicking off his shoes, he goes out to join her, enjoying the feel of cold water against his hot skin. The night is still warm, and he likes the closeness of it. He likes even more the closeness between himself and Ruth when she steps into him and presses her lips to his.

It isn't long before she pulls her hands between them and fumbles with his shirt buttons until she can push the sodden garment off his shoulders and onto the floor. In turn, he strokes her wet hair back from her face and then slips the slim straps of her dress down her arms. The dress stays on, moulded on by water, but he decides he can deal with that later. For now, he is too interested to find out what the rainwater tastes like on her skin. He dips his head to her chest.

* * *

Once, when she was about five years old, there had been a massive rainstorm in the summer. Ruth had run outside and let the rain soak her, and she thinks, even now, that it is still one of the happiest experiences of her life.

It is, however, fast becoming eclipsed by the particular happy experience in a rainstorm. She leans back against the balcony as Harry's lips connect with the skin of her chest, feeling the metal bar digging in against her shoulder blade. She holds Harry's head lightly in her hands, running her fingers through his wet hair. She doesn't think she has ever wanted a man this badly in her life.

And, if the evidence is anything to go by, Harry wants her quite a bit too.

She tugs him back up to her and then walks him backwards to the deck chair in the corner of the balcony, which offers them privacy as well as a comfortable flat surface. It is set just back under the shelter near the entrance to their room, but the violence of the rain has still managed to splash up and soak it through. Ruth pushes Harry down onto the chair. His gaze has locked onto hers, his eyes dark and wanting. She likes it. It makes her feel desired, and powerful.

She straddles Harry's hips, feeling the material of her dress tug against her body as the sodden material gets stuck between them, dragging down the neckline a little more. She pulls her arms out of the straps and then leans down to kiss the man beneath her.

* * *

Harry is not a man to let that sort of opportunity pass him by, no matter how chaotic and incoherent most of his thoughts currently are. He reaches up and carefully draws Ruth's dress down to her waist. Her skin is cold with rain and warm with the heat of the night and blood rushing beneath her skin. She is smooth and soft and he likes how her skin feels against his.

He starts trailing his fingers up and down her sides, feeling her ribs and the soft swell of her breasts as she leans over him. She has one hand by his head to steady herself, and her other hand is busied with stroking the sensitive skin at his hip. He never knew that spot could be so erotic, but as she applies light pressure with her thumb just next to his hipbone, he is unable to control his hips bucking up towards hers.

She gasps at the increased contact and pulls her mouth away from his. She keeps her head close, though, and he can feel her warm breath on his face. Ruth moves after a moment, shifting down his body and sitting up slightly so she can access the buckle of his belt.

In the back of his mind, he thinks he might do away with belts now. They're only going to get in the way.

The thought is fleeting; the sight of Ruth sitting above him, half-naked and dripping with rain, is one to drive all intelligence out of him. He pulls her back to him for a quick, graceless kiss before he lets her go back to the task of getting rid of the rest of his clothes. "You're gorgeous," he tells her.

"Kiss me again," she says.

He isn't about to refuse.

* * *

Another crack of thunder sounds overhead as Ruth reaches under her dress to pull off her underwear. She thinks about how this is so unlike anything she has ever done – when it comes to sex, she is normally an under the duvet with as few lights on as possible kind of girl.

True, it isn't particularly bright right now, but outside, in the rain, in Mexico, is something rather different for her.

Harry is rather different for her too. The way he holds her – confident yet tender, firm and precise - and looks at her as she hovers over him is like nothing she's ever known, and it pushes away any remaining doubts she might have had about this being too soon, too rushed. She doesn't think they could have done anything else.

She settles herself against him, feels the cool water and the heat beneath his skin. She runs her hands over his chest and then down, over his stomach, brushing over his thighs briefly before she takes his erection in her hand.

He holds her hips as she lifts herself up and guides him to her. She thinks that later, once they are inside and in bed, they will have to take their time. They will have to spend some time exploring each other with little touches and kisses, and exchanging affectionate whispers. But this, right now, is exactly what she needs. And, as she lowers herself down onto Harry and feels him start to stretch her, and sees the exquisite tension in his face, it seems quite clear to her that this is what he needs too.

* * *

Harry can hear the thunder and the rain, and the quiet sounds that Ruth is making. He can see the water and the heavy clouds hanging low in the sky, but mostly he can see Ruth above him, moving slowly as they get used to the feel of each other.

Her dress is still clinging around her waist. Harry suspects that it might be stretched beyond all recognition before too long, but he doesn't have it in him to care. He'll buy her a new one. For now, all that matters is making her lose herself as much as he feels himself getting lost in what they are doing.

He slides his hands up from her waist to cup her breasts in his palms. She pushes into him at the touch and her head falls back. She starts moving faster above him, and Harry drives his hips up to meet her. A brilliant flash of lightning lights up the world for an instant and the look that he sees on Ruth's face is one of ecstasy. He makes a vow there and then to put that look there as often as possible.

There is a growing tightening low in his belly that he can't ignore. Ruth is hot and tight around him, and this has been so long coming. He feels himself tensing, and knows she feels it too when she opens her eyes and smiles down at him, a wicked, primal smile that is filthy and sweet at the same time.

Harry rubs his thumb over her nipple, making her gasp. Water runs down both of their faces, and when Ruth opens her mouth to taste it, Harry almost comes there and then. He slides his other hand down her body to find where they are joined, hidden just beneath the fabric of her dress. She moves the skirts out of the way and he groans at the sight.

"God," he says, his head slamming back and stars starting to appear behind his eyes. He quickly finds the bundle of nerves that will make Ruth see stars too, and presses down lightly.

She comes around him, and the increased pressure is all it takes for him to come too. He is fairly certain that he blacks out for a minute, because when he becomes aware of his surroundings again, Ruth is collapsed across his chest, floppy and spent.

High above them, there is a tiny break in the clouds, and he can just make out a couple of stars starting to appear.

* * *

The air is clean and fresh the next morning, and the heat from the sun as it streams into their room is gentle as it starts to rise in the sky. On the bed, Harry shifts to face Ruth, lifting one hand to stroke her hair, still slightly damp from sweat and rainwater.

Her eyes open slowly before she turns to him, lazily looping one arm over his waist and snuggling in again, drifting almost immediately back off to sleep. Dawn might be breaking, and he might be an early riser by habit, but this time Harry joins her.

As he feels sleep overcome him once more, he says, very quietly and sincerely, "I'm so glad you came."

* * *

**Thanks for reading! x**


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